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With all eyes on Trump and GOP, Clinton lies low

The Lowell Sun

Updated:
12/22/2015 07:58:53 AM EST

By Anne Gearan and Dan Balz

The Washington Post

Amid the din of the Republican race for president and the scramble of the week before Christmas, you can be forgiven for not knowing that there was a Democratic debate Saturday night. And the fact that you probably did not watch -- that you had other things to do -- is just fine by Hillary Clinton.

For now, the Democratic front-runner and her primary challengers are being eclipsed by the carnival-like contest on the other side, as billionaire Donald Trump and more than a dozen others battle it out for the Republican nomination.

Accustomed to being the most-watched candidate, Clinton is biding her time out of the spotlight and under less scrutiny. The relative doldrums also deprive her rivals, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley, of the public and media attention they need far more than Clinton.

This weekend, Sanders complained that Democratic Party officials were trying to "protect" Clinton by scheduling debates at times of low viewership. The objection comes at a time when Sanders has sagged in the polls and is coping with a sudden controversy over campaign workers who gained inappropriate access to Clinton voter information in a party database.

"If she continues to be in the driver's seat while the Republicans are sucking all the oxygen out of the room, that means she's not getting a lot of attention.

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It also means no other Democrat is getting oxygen," said Mo Elleithee, a Clinton campaign aide during her failed 2008 run and now director of the Georgetown University Institute of Politics and Public Service. "That is not much of a problem for her now, but it is beyond a problem for Bernie Sanders and Martin O'Malley."

But the overall sense of a lull in the Democratic race has real potential downsides as well, suggesting higher enthusiasm on the GOP side and underscoring Clinton's persistent problem in generating excitement for her candidacy within the liberal base.

It also allows Republicans to use their debates and the attention commanded by Trump and others to pound President Barack Obama's national security policy as weak and ineffective -- and to tie them to Clinton as Obama's first-term secretary of state. The longer those criticisms go unanswered -- or the longer rebuttals from Clinton are largely unheard by the public -- the bigger problem it could pose for Clinton going into a general election.

This has been a persistent concern for Democrats this year, Elleithee said. At first, there was pressure on Clinton to get into the race earlier than she did, to answer a GOP field largely focused on criticizing her. And now there is some discomfort with the notion that Democratic priorities are getting less attention nationally, he said.

The overshadowing of the Democratic race -- and of Clinton's candidacy -- is a striking change from the first half of the year, when the spotlight was predominantly on Clinton. Then, she towered above any of her potential Republican rivals, with the possible exception of former Florida governor Jeb Bush.

Today, it is Trump and the chaotic Republican race that have captured the country's attention, and many of the other GOP candidates are now tied or beating her in head-to-head matchups.

In another year, the last debate of the year - and the second-to-last such forum before the first caucus votes are cast in Iowa -- might attract considerable attention. But early ratings data suggests that sponsor ABC News probably got around 8 million viewers, less than half of the 18 million viewers for CNN's Republican debate four days earlier.

The Democratic debate in New Hampshire caps a comeback for Clinton after a rocky summer defined by Sanders's unexpected surge and fumbles by the Clinton camp that rattled supporters. The dynamics of the two races began to change in October, when Clinton survived 11 hours of testimony before the House Benghazi committee, Vice President Joe Biden decided not to enter the race and she performed well in the first Democratic debate.

"October provided a resurgence for her," said former Obama adviser David Axelrod.

The end of 2015 leaves the Democratic race more or less where it was at the start of last spring, with Clinton an overwhelming favorite for her party's nomination and facing a Republican threat of unknown potency. Her primary struggles, if brief, helped dispel the sense that she took the nomination for granted, but now that the race is more settled it is also more predictable and, at times, dull.

What has happened is the reverse of Clinton's first campaign for the White House in 2008, when she and Obama carried on an epic battle for the Democratic nomination, overshadowing the Republican Party's contest.

Obama benefited from the long battle with Clinton. The drawn-out race, in essence, helped to certify him as ready for the general election.

He was strengthened by the conflict with a rival as formidable as Clinton. If she were to win the Democratic nomination relatively quickly, Clinton would not have the opportunity to show the same.

Instead, Axelrod said, "she started as such a prohibitive favorite, and there was this long period of humbling."

The humbling came from two directions. First was the controversy over her use of a private email account and server while at the State Department, which she and her campaign mishandled for months. Then there was the rise of Sanders, who energized the party's progressive grass roots and began to challenge her in both Iowa and New Hampshire.

By late summer, she looked increasingly vulnerable.

Axelrod said the fading attention on the Democratic race this time helped Clinton, who does not need to demonstrate her staying power to the extent that Obama did eight years ago.

"She has nothing to prove on that," he said. "She comes off as strong.

She comes off as commanding. Whatever liabilities she has -- and she has them -- those happen to be her strengths. Strength is her strength."

One of her key weaknesses, however, is lingering distrust by many voters. She leads Sanders in the latest Washington Post-ABC News poll by a wide margin. But he is seen, even among Democrats, as more honest.

If she becomes the nominee, Clinton probably will carry that liability into a general election, regardless of whether she has defeated Sanders quickly or after a drawn-out contest. Neither the spotlight nor the shadows are likely to change that in the immediate future.

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